Jacksonville Sharks win season finale over L.A. Kiss

Jacksonville Sharks Information

The Jacksonville Sharks 53-36 win over the Los Angeles Kiss Saturday night at the Veterans Memorial Arena didn’t take much of the sting out of a 7-11 season, but it did leave a better feeling for Sharks players and coaches heading into the offseason.

The Sharks failed to win the American Conference South Division title for the fifth year in a row and worse, failed to qualify for the playoffs for the first time in the franchise’s five-year history.

Had the Sharks played other teams like they did the Kiss, they might have reversed the record and been in position to start practicing this week for a playoff game. Not that Los Angeles (3-15) was a good barometer of the rest of the league. Instead, the Sharks can just look back and reflect on a season in which they never got to or over the .500 mark after the fourth game of the season.

“I felt we were a good enough team to make the playoffs from day one, but we didn’t play well enough,” Sharks coach Les Moss said.

It wasn’t just the way the Sharks played this season, Moss said. A lot of the club’s struggles fall back on him.

“Quite honestly, it starts with the way I coached and some of the decisions that I made,” he said, shaking his head. “In hindsight, looking back at some of the personnel decisions that were made before the season began and during the season, were mistakes on my part. It all falls on me, I’m the head coach.

“I’ve always said when we win, the players deserve the credit, and when we lose, it falls on the coach.”

If that’s the case, several players deserve a lot of credit in the season finale, none more than RJ Archer. The Sharks quarterback turned in a solid effort of 25-for-36 for 318 yards and six touchdowns. His two favorite receivers were Jeff Hughley (9 catches, 106 yards, 1 TD) and Jomo Wilson (7, 99, 2 scores). Jeron Harvey also scored twice on his four catches for 44 yards.

Archer called it a disappointing season but said it was nice to at least go out a winner. He already started looking ahead to next year.

“Teams shake up all the time, so you never know who’s going to be here next year,” Archer said. “We’ll see what happens next year. It’s always nice to get a win. You know in the arena game you get so many crazy bounces you never know what’s going to happen. We’ve got good players, we can beat anyone in the league. We just had some tough breaks and losses along the way.”